Tutorial: DOI. No. 10.1109/MAES.2018.

160146

Passive Radar Tutorial

Heiner Kuschel, Diego Cristallini, Fraunhofer, Germany
Karl Erik Olsen, Norwegian Defence Research Establishment, Norway

Passive Radar signifying the localisation of a target by radar ted waveforms of such transmitters of opportunity are normally not
measurements without using own controlled emissions has optimised for radar purposes, the receiver structure and receiver
been discussed, tried, reinvented, and matured within the last processing have to be specifically tailored to exploit such wave-
80 years. Its advantages, like covert operation and saving the forms. Omnidirectional surveillance often requires multichannel
costs of a transmitter, are obvious. Military as well as civilian array antennas of circular geometry spanning a relatively large
interests combined with the advances in technological devel- bandwidth. Receiver channels in the in the UHF-region and below
opments have recently boosted research on passive radar and allow digitization of the received signals close to the antenna ele-
passive radar systems are currently approaching the market. ments and features software defined radar where all the process-
This tutorial shall give an overview of the history, develop- ing happens in the digital domain. This leaves the Analog-Digital
ment, and processing in passive radar and enable the inter- (AD) converter as the decisive element. Powerful Central Process-
ested reader to further investigate the subject exploiting the ing Units (CPUs) and even Graphics Processing Units (GPUs)
presented material together with the cited references. are available today to support the required radar processing (e.g.,
cross-correlation, beam forming, direct signal suppression, and di-
rect signal reconstruction in the case of digital waveforms).
I. INTRODUCTION Such advanced signal processing approaches have been re-
Passive Coherent Location (PCL) systems have received significant ported in the literature and at conferences in increasing numbers
interest in the academic and military communities. Since the end of in recent years, and indicate that the main driver for most research
World War II the interest in bistatic radars has been cyclic, with a and development has been the military air surveillance application.
periodicity of 15 to 20 years [1, Preface]. The most successful bi- However, niche applications have also been addressed in the civil-
static radar application since the mid-40s is the semiactive homing ian world, taking advantage of the already available illuminations
missiles. Interest in PCL is currently at a lasting peak, mainly due and thus avoiding further cluttering of the spectrum.
to rapidly emerging technology which has matured enough for the
military to see PCL as a potential sensor for surveillance.
The attractive features of passive radar from a military point A. STRUCTURE OF THE TUTORIAL
of view are its covertness (the ability to perform situational aware-
The tutorial has been structured in the following way: After a brief
ness without revealing the position of the sensor through emission
introduction, an excursion into the history of passive radar and the
of radar signals), and the fact that most of the potential illuminators
basic principle of passive radar leads to a survey of the most fre-
of opportunity, namely broadcast transmitters, operate in the lower
quently used illuminators of opportunity and their properties.
frequency bands (Very High Frequency (VHF) and Ultra High Fre-
Since passive radar is inherently bi- or multistatic, a major sec-
quency (UHF)) which provides some antistealth detection capabil-
tion of the tutorial deals with the features and constraints of bistatic
ity. Being completely passive, the deployment of the receiver does
radar, ranging from bistatic geometry and the bistatic radar equa-
not require frequency allocation and thus allows operation in densely
tion to the bistatic ambiguity function.
populated areas where electromagnetic “pollution” can be an issue.
The tutorial then describes the processing steps typically per-
The frequently quoted argument that PCL is cheaper than ac-
formed in passive radar systems, starting with the cross-correlation
tive radar is still to be proven; however, it surely needs less main-
of the surveillance and reference channels, all the way through to
tenance.
the tracking of targets in Cartesian space.
Passive radar consists of one or multiple transmitters of oppor-
An outlook to future perspectives in processing and technology
tunity, and a network of one or more receivers. Since the transmit-
and a list of recent major publications related to the subject of pas-
sive radar finishes the tutorial.
Authors' current address: Fraunhofer FHR, PSR, Fraunhofer
Str. 20, Wachtberg, 53343, Germany, E-mail: (hihei-kus@mail.
de).
II. NOMENCLATURE AND DEFINITIONS
Manuscript received July 4, 2016, revised July 17, 2017, and As of today, a generally accepted definition of a passive radar system
ready for publication December 5, 2017. does not exist, nor a unified name for such systems. This chapter
Review handled by W. Blair.
provides some of the published definitions and their interpretations.
0885/8985/19/$26.00 © 2019 IEEE

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 PCL, Passive Covert Radar (PCR), Passive Bistatic Radar [3], [4], Thales' Home Alerter 100 [5], and HENSOLDT “Passive
(PBR), passive radar, multistatic radar, parasitic radar, commen- Radar” [6], [7]. The PCL-systems may be considered as systems
sal radar, symbiotic radar, and hitchhiking radar are all common of PBR systems. This work will focus on the system perspective of
names for passive radar systems exploiting cooperative, noncoop- the technology, i.e., PCL, while relying on the technical depths of
erative transmitters, or transmitters of opportunity, [1, p. 3]. A re- the PBR technology.
cent review of the various names resulted in the compromise PBR, In 1990 Willis wrote the Bistatic Radar chapter in Skolnik's Ra-
[2, p. 248]. However, it should be noted that the PCL name is still dar Handbook [8]. Willis defined a bistatic radar to be a radar that
being used for full systems like Lockheed Martin's Silent Sentry® employs two sites, transmit and receive, which are separated by a

ACRONYMS
AD Analog-Digital IEEE Institute of Electrical and Electronics
Engineers
ADS Automatic Dependent Surveillance IMM Interacting Multiple Model
AWGN Additive White Gaussian Noise IO Illuminators of Opportunity
BBC British Broadcasting Corporation ISAR Inverse Synthetic Aperture Radar
CFAR Constant False Alarm Rate LEO Low Earth Orbit
CORA COvert RAdar LORA Linear array cOvert RAdar
CPI Coherent Processing Interval LTE Long Term Evolution
CPU Central Processing Unit MFN Multiple Frequency Network
DAB Digital Audio Broadcast MHT Multi Hypothesis Tracker
DELIA Dab Experimental radar with Linear Array MIMO Multiple In Multiple Out
DOA Direction of Arrival NCTR Non Cooperative Target Recognition
DRG Defence Research Group OFDM Orthogonal Frequency Division Modulation
DVB-T Digital Video Broadcast - Terrestrial ONERA Office National d’Etudes et Recherches
Aérospatiales
DVB-S Digital Video Broadcast - Satellite OTH Over The Horizon
DVB-SH Digital Video Broadcast - Satellite Handheld PARADE Passive Radar Demonstration
EIRP Equivalent Isotropically Radiated Power PBR Passive Bistatic Radar
ERP Equivalent Radiated Power PCL Passive Coherent Location
FFI Forsvarets forskningsinstitutt PCR Passive Covert Radar
FFT Fast Fourier Transform PDF Probability Density Function
FGAN Forschungsgesellschaft für Angewandte PETRA Passive Experimental Tv RAdar Plans and
Naturwissenschaften Programmes
FHR Fraunhofer-Institut für Hochfrequenzphysik RCS Radar Cross Section
und Radartechnik
FM Frequency Modulation RF Radio Frequency
GPS Global Positioning System SAR Synthetic Aperture Radar
GLONASS GLObal NAvigation Satellite System SFN Single Frequency Network
GMTI Ground Moving Target Indicator SNR Signal to Noise Ratio
GNN Global Nearest Neighbor TDOA Time Difference of Arrival
GNSS Global Navigation Satellite System UCL University College London
GPU Graphics Processing Unit UHF Ultra High Frequency
GSM Global System for Mobile communications VHF Very High Frequency
HiperLAN High Performance Radio LAN WiFi Wireless Fidelity
HRR High Range Resolution WiMAX Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave
access

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Passive Radar Tutorial

considerable distance, a statement he

never clarified even though he men-
tioned two examples to clarify it: 1)
A radar using different transmit and
receive antennas at a single site should
be considered monostatic. 2) An Over
the Horizon radar's transmitter and re-
ceiver could be separated by 100 km
or more, and still be considered mono-
static when the target location is thou-
sands of kilometres.
In Bistatic Radar [9] Willis uses
the Institute of Electrical and Elec-
tronics Engineers (IEEE) bistatic
radar definition: Bistatic radar is de-
fined as a radar that uses antennas at
different locations for transmission
and reception. Willis points out that
the IEEE definition does not specify
how far the transmitting and receiv-
ing sites must be separated. Attempts
to quantify this separation have been
made by both Skolnik [8] and Blake
[10], [11]. Figure 1.
Willis writes that Skolnik (1990) Artist impression of Daventry experiment. Courtesy of BAE-Systems.
[8] defined the separation as “a con-
siderable distance,” while he earlier
[12] considered considerable distance of signals of several spatially separated transmitting, receiving or
as “comparable with the target distance,” a definition which prin- transceiving positions. And to sum it up, a multistatic radar is de-
cipally applies to forward-scatter fences. Willis also claims that fined according to IEEE [14]: “A radar system having two or more
Skolnik in the same paper defined the separation such that “… the transmitting or receiving antennas with all antennas separated by
echo signal does not travel over the same [total] path as the trans- large distances when compared to the antenna sizes.”
mitted signal.”
Blake [10], [11] defines two conditions for separation of trans-
mitter and receiver by demanding either “… the directions of the
III. HISTORY OF PASSIVE RADAR
transmitter and receiver [from the target] differ by an angle that is The history of passive radar measurements with the aim of detect-
comparable to or greater than either beamwidth” or “… the dis- ing aircraft targets dates back to 1935, when Sir Robert Watson-
tances from the target to the transmitter [RT] and receiver [RR] dif- Watt conducted the Daventry experiment. More than 80 years of
fer by an amount that is a significant fraction of either distance.” development in passive radar followed. The milestones achieved
These definitions apply to all bistatic configurations, includ- during those 80 years are illuminated in this chapter and indicate
ing forward-scatter fences, but they do not provide a measurable that the renewed interest in recent years is correlated to the techno-
quantity due to the terms “comparable” and “significant fraction.” logical development in computing power.
The Radar Technology Encyclopedia [13] by Barton and Leonov In the Daventry experiment, Sir Robert Watson-Watt used the
uses the definition of Willis: “A bistatic radar, by definition, is one illumination from the shortwave (49 m wavelength) British Broad-
in which the transmitter and receiver sites are separated by a sig- casting Corporation (BBC) Empire transmitter at Daventry to detect
nificant distance.” a Heyford bomber aircraft at short distance (8 km) [15], [16]. Fig. 1
The IEEE [14] defines a bistatic radar as: “A radar using anten- shows a sketch of the Daventry experiment. The Heyford was flown
nas for transmission and reception at sufficiently different loca- on a path between Weedon and the BBC transmitter at Daventry.
tions that the angles or ranges from those locations to the target are Later, Sir Robert Watson-Watts' research led to the installation of
significantly different.” a chain of radars along the south and east coast of England, known
Willis [9] defines a radar multistatic when “… two or more as the Chain Home radars [17]. While the Chain Home radars were
receiving sites with common (or overlapping) spatial coverage are active radars operating with a transmitting power of 350 kW (later
employed, and data from targets in the common coverage area are 750 kW) at a frequency of 20–30 MHz, on the German side passive
combined at a central location.” The Radar Technology Encyclo- radars were installed along the continental Channel coast. Since
pedia [13] defines multistatic radar as a radar in which informa- 1943, the German “Klein Heidelberg” receivers located near the
tion on a target is obtained by means of simultaneous processing Channel coast line exploited the emissions of the British “Chain

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 Kuschel, Cristallini, and Olsen

Figure 2.
Klein Heidelberg receiver and Chain Home radars.

Home” radars to detect in-coming aircraft [18]. These were the first
operational passive radars. Resistance to the British jammers was
the main advantage of the passive Klein Heidelberg receivers over
the German active radars Freya, Mammut, Wasserman, and Würz-
burg. After preliminary trials at “mount couple” between Calais and
Boulogne, four Klein Heidelberg receivers were set into operation
during the summer of 1944 at Oostvoorne, den Haan, Boulogne,
Figure 3.
and Abbeville. Fig. 2 shows the location of the Oostvoorne station Klein Heidelberg antenna.
and the illuminating Chain Home radars.
A picture of the Klein Heidelberg antenna based on a 40 m
dominant VHF/UHF illuminators successfully counter stealth. PCL
Wasserman S tower is shown in Fig. 3. The main antenna consisted
studies were conducted at University College London (UCL), where
of 18 dipole elements in front of a reflector plane positioned in
Griffiths and Long investigated the use of analogue television (TV)
three column arrays of six elements each. It spanned a beamwidth
transmissions from Crystal Palace for the detection of aircraft targets
of 45 degrees in azimuth and provided an angular measurement
[20]. Additionally, Howland utilised the analogue TV video carrier,
accuracy of about 5 degrees. An additional dipole antenna at 15 m
again from the venerable Crystal Palace transmitter, to detect and
height received the direct transmitted signal.
track air-liners to ranges of up to 260 km. These studies demonstrated
With the invention of the duplexer in 1936, which permitted
the feasibility of the principle of PCL technology. At the same time,
the rapid development of the operationally more convenient, single-
Thales in France obtained a patent on a method which exploits the
site, monostatic radar, interest in passive radar was temporarily lost.
spectral shift of the TV-carrier and the line synchronisation pulses
A further revival of PCR, or equivalently PCL, occurred in the
of a moving target echo versus the direct signal for passive target
1990s when the North Atlantic Treaty Organization Defence Re-
detection ranging. A demonstration of passive radar target detection
search Group launched a study on passive and noise radar that was
using the illumination of a Russian type P18 VHF-surveillance ra-
concluded by a symposium [19]. In addition to the pulse-chasing
dar was conducted under the name of Passive Radar Demonstration
principle, which applies to the exploitation of noncooperative pulsed
in 2001 by Forschungsgesellschaft für Angewandte Naturwissen-
radar signals as the illumination, broadcast transmitters were dis-
schaften (FGAN)-Fraunhofer-Institut für Hochfrequenzphysik und
covered as potential sources for PCR. The new motivation for pas-
Radartechnik (FHR) in cooperation with the Hungarian Technology
sive radar was, in addition to its covertness, the system’s inherent
agency. As a further source of illumination being available in almost
antistealth capability. Since stealth technology primarily aims at the
all parts of the world, Frequency Modulation (FM)-radio signals
reduction of an aircraft's Radar Cross Section (RCS) with respect to
were exploited in many PCR system designs. The first commercial
mono-static radars at operational radar frequencies from L1- to X-
PCR prototype using FM-radio broadcast emissions was developed
band2, the bi- or multistatic geometry of passive radars and their pre-
by Lockheed-Martin [21] and is referred to as “Silent Sentry” (see
1
L-band: 1–2 GHz Fig. 4), thus underlining the sensor’s covertness. In France, a small
2
X-band: 8–12 GHz company Communication et Téléphonie developed a system called

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Passive Radar Tutorial

Figure 4.
Silent Sentry 3 setup (courtesy of Lockheed-Martin) .

Occiu [22], which consisted of an 8-element antenna array, an off-

the-shelf computer, sophisticated signal processing, and a mission
planning software “Aneth.” Other European industries like Thales
and European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS)
Figure 5.
among others became interested in the new sensor approach. In retro- LORA11 DVB-T PCL-System of FHR and FFI with linear array
spect, Occiu can be considered the predecessor to HA100 by Thales. antenna.
The name HA100, standing for Homeland Alerter with about 100
km detection range, suggests the role foreseen for this type of sen- Since the illuminating signal is not a priori known to the pas-
sor. Later, other industries like Leonardo, HENSOLDT, and ERA as sive radar receiver, it has to measure both the signal to be exploited
well as research institutions like NC3A [9], Warsaw University of as well as the signal reflected off the target. Further, the radar has
Technology, and Office National d'Etudes et Recherches Aérospatia- to preprocess the two signals, cross-correlate them, detect the tar-
les (ONERA) joined in with experimental systems or demonstrators. gets, and finally track the targets. This section will elaborate on the
Fraunhofer FHR during that period had developed and operated a basic principles of passive radar.
number of experimental systems like COvert RAdar (CORA), Pas- The principle of operation of passive radar is based on cross-
sive Experimental Tv RAdar (PETRA), and Dab Experimental ra- correlating the signal received directly from a transmitter with its
dar with Linear Array (DELIA) [23], leading to a demonstrator for reflections from a target. A typical geometry is sketched in Fig. 6.
Digital Video Broadcast—Terrestrial (DVB-T) PCL, Linear array
cOvert RAdar (LORA)11 [24] (Fig. 5), the use of which was shared
with Forsvarets forskningsinstitutt (FFI) of Norway. The handling of
A. TIME DIFFERENCE OF ARRIVAL MEASUREMENT
vast amounts of data at reasonable processing times was facilitated The PCL receiver measures the Time Difference of Arrival (TDOA)
by technological development. Direct Radio Frequency (RF)-signal between the direct signal and the reflected echo. The bistatic range
digitisation and applying the “software defined radar” principle fur- measurement is retrieved from a TDOA measurement considering
ther supported the applicability of passive radar for military and civil the electromagnetic wave propagation speed. Cross-correlation
security purposes. between the direct reference signal and the reflected echo results
in the two-dimensional range-Doppler matrix. This means that dif-
ferent possible Doppler modulated replicas of the direct signal are
IV. PASSIVE RADAR PRINCIPLE OF OPERATION cross-correlated with the echo signals. As a consequence, a PCL
The expression “passive radar systems” indicates a class of bistatic radar system is also able to estimate the bistatic Doppler frequency
radar systems that do not transmit a dedicated electromagnetic sig- (which is equivalent to the bistatic range rate). It is well known that
nal, but instead exploit electromagnetic signals emitted by other a bistatic range measurement locates the target onto an ellipsoid
sources for other purposes. Such sources are usually referred to as that has the transmitter and the receiver located at its foci.
“illuminators of opportunity” and examples include other radars, Target positions are obtained by either using multiple transmit-
communication systems, and broadcast systems for public utility. ters or receivers to determine the ellipsoid intersections, or by mea-

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 Kuschel, Cristallini, and Olsen

Figure 6.
Sketch of the PCL geometry.

suring the target direction and its intersection with the ellipsoid.
The accuracy of the target position strongly depends on the band-
width of the utilised signal and the receiver antenna beam-width,
and is often considered a criterion for determining the suitability of
passive radar systems for particular applications.
Figure 7.
Basic analogue PCL signal processing.
B. DOPPLER PROCESSING
On the other hand, if a single bistatic pair is considered, the bistatic the contribution of the direct signal. A block diagram of the basic
Doppler information cannot be used to locate the target since the signal processing steps foreseen in a PCL radar system is reported
target direction of motion is unknown. The PCL Doppler resolution in Fig. 7. In general, two channels are required, one dedicated to
is usually very high since long integration times are exploited. This the collection of the direct signal and referred to as “reference re-
simple principle of operation conceals various important issues ceiver” (e.g., this receiving channel will be connected to an anten-
that characterize the performance of PCL systems, and that drive na pointing directly toward the transmitter of opportunity), and a
the corresponding research activities. First of all, the transmitted “surveillance receiver” whose aim is the collection of target echoes
signal is not known a priori, and its characteristics are not under signals. Eventually, the surveillance receiver can be multi-channel,
the control of the radar designer. This requires ad hoc hardware thus increasing the overall capabilities of the PCL system.
and signal processing to retrieve a copy or replica of the signal that On the other hand, the reference receiver is usually single chan-
is being transmitted. Moreover, the transmitted signal usually has nel. It is clear that a dedicated reference receiver channel is required
spectral characteristics that do not match the needs of a radar, since because the transmitted signal is not known a priori. Basically, it
it is designed for other purposes. is important to receive the reference signal as clean as possible,
The main consequences are that the signal bandwidth is typi- which generally requires a line-of-sight to the transmitter and a
cally limited (not allowing high resolution radar capability), and highly directional antenna in order to avoid multipath. This is a par-
its frequency is usually below that of conventional active radars. ticularly important requirement when analogue (broadcast) signals
However, the signal bandwidth is highly dependent on the exploit- are exploited, which do not offer the possibility of reconstructing
ed illuminators of opportunity, and there exist several illuminators the transmitted signal from signal synchronization features. Fig.
of opportunity providing signal bandwidths adequate for radar pur- 7 shows the general analogue processing chain which starts with
poses (such as air target detection). The lower signal frequency is cross-correlating the reference channel with the surveillance chan-
not necessarily a drawback in PCL systems, since it offers the pos- nel and ends with tracking detected targets in the Cartesian domain.
sibility to measure target RCS signatures at different frequencies, One of the most important steps in the processing chain is the sup-
which might help towards target identification and classification pression of the direct signal since its correlation sidelobes might
approaches and bears antistealth capabilities. mask weak target echoes. The direct signal suppression can be
achieved by filtering the received signal spatially (e.g., by pointing
a minimum of the receiver antenna diagram towards the transmit-
C. PROCESSING SCHEMES ter), or in the time domain (e.g., by coherently subtracting the direct
As seen from the sketched geometry in Fig. 6, it can be expected signal contribution from the surveillance channel). In the following
that the echo signal reflected from the target will be masked by the sections, deeper insights into these approaches are presented.
direct signal unless it is separated by Doppler. The direct signal This basic processing scheme can be refined if a digital trans-
travels a shorter distance and it is not further attenuated by the mission of opportunity is exploited (see Fig. 8). In fact, as men-
reflection process at the target. Thus, in order to be able to detect tioned above, the direct signal is likely to be the strongest signal
low Doppler targets, additional processing is required to suppress contribution in the “surveillance channel.” As a consequence, after

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Passive Radar Tutorial

on waveforms, antenna design and network concepts for terrestrial

broadcast services.

A. CLASSES OF ILLUMINATORS
There are multiple possible classification criteria for illuminators
that one might choose, like signal modulation or purpose of trans-
mission. However, dividing them into terrestrial and space borne
classes indicates what is primarily used today and what probably
will be desired in the future.
Illuminators of Opportunity (IO) belonging to the terrestrial
class are:

CC other radars: for example, radars used for air traffic control
or for maritime coastal monitoring;

CC mobile communication systems: base stations for Glob-

al System for Mobile communications (GSM), Univer-
sal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), Long
Term Evolution (LTE); access points for Wireless Fidelity
(WiFi), Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave access
(WiMAX), High Performance Radio LAN (HiperLAN);
Figure 8. CC broadcast systems for public utility: FM and Digital Audio
Basic PCL signal processing using digital transmitter. Broadcast (DAB) radio (analogue and digital, respectively);
analogue TV and DVB-T (also known as digital TV).
proper synchronization and by knowing the transmission standard,
Illuminators of opportunity belonging to the space borne class are:
it is possible to decode the transmitted stream of bits, and then
re-code this stream to reconstruct the original transmitted signal. CC other radars: for example, radars used for Earth monitoring
This operation can be done using a single channel surveillance and remote sensing applications;
receiver, with significant reduction of costs and system complex-
CC broadcast systems for public utility: such as Digital Video
ity. If this second approach is followed, the block diagram in Fig.
Broadcast—Satellite (DVB-S) (also known as digital satel-
7 would be modified to the one depicted in Fig. 8. In both cases,
lite TV), and its handheld variation Digital Video Broad-
a cleaned version of the transmitted signal is used to remove the
cast—Satellite Handheld (DVB-SH);
direct signal contribution together with eventual multipaths com-
ponents from the surveillance channel. This step is labeled “dis- CC mobile communication systems: like Globalstar, Iridium,
turbance cancellation.” After direct signal removal, the “cleaned” and Orbcomm;
surveillance signal is cross-correlated with the “cleaned” refer-
CC geolocalization system: transmitters like Global Positioning
ence signal to produce one range-Doppler map per Coherent
System (GPS), GLObal NAvigation Satellite System, and
Processing Interval (CPI). Over each range-Doppler map target
the future GALILEO.
detection is performed (for instance resorting to Constant False
Alarm Rate approaches). Detections collected from multiple CPIs Among these different possibilities, a good IO for PCL should
can be further processed to produce tracks of detected targets. Tar- provide a reliable continuous transmitted signal over time, with a
get tracking can be performed in the range-Doppler domain, or strong Equivalent Isotropically Radiated Power (EIRP), possibly
in Cartesian coordinates if target geo-localization is available. It over a wide area. For this last reason, other radars are usually ex-
can be shown that two-stage tracking (both in range-Doppler and cluded from the analysis.
in Cartesian coordinates) might drastically reduce the resulting
number of false alarms.
B. MODULATION PROPERTIES
As briefly discussed before, the transmitted signal characteristics
V. ILLUMINATORS OF OPPORTUNITY should be as uniform as possible. For this reason, digital transmis-
The passive radar relies on transmitters of opportunity which have sions are generally more favourable with respect to analogue trans-
primary functions other than to serve as radar illuminators. This missions. An example is represented by FM radio. Given its wide
section will explain what types of illuminators are available and availability and reasonable transmit power, FM radio has been
how their specific properties impact on passive radar processing largely exploited for PCL purposes in the early years of the 21st
requirements. After generally classifying the transmitters of op- century. However, FM radio modulation is analogue, which means
portunity into space borne and terrestrial, a focus will be placed that the effective instantaneous signal bandwidth is highly de-

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 Kuschel, Cristallini, and Olsen

pendent on the program content being

broadcasted. Specifically, rock music
seems to be most advantageous due to a
comparably large constant bandwidth,
while oral contributions like news are
the least favourable (an explanatory
example of PCL performance for dif-
ferent transmitted FM radio signals can
be observed by comparing the ambigu-
ity functions in Figs. 7.10 and 7.11 in
[23]). Careful selection of the transmit-
ter to be used is therefore required for
optimum performance. For this reason,
the exploitation of FM radio started to
rapidly diminish as other digital broad-
cast services entered into operation,
such as DAB and DVB-T. DAB and
DVB-T (namely terrestrial digital ra- Figure 9.
dio and television, respectively) use an Brief comparison of FM radio, DAB radio, and DVB-T.
Orthogonal Frequency Division Modu-
lation (OFDM) scheme which guarantees constant signal features, largely developed. Fig. 9 reports a comparative overview of FM
namely constant bandwidth, and (predictable) range/Doppler/ radio, DAB, and DVB-T.
sidelobe characteristics of the auto-ambiguity function. However, Considering the satellite class of illuminators of opportunity,
digital modulation schemes also present drawbacks mainly related Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) systems clearly offer
to periodicities in the signal structure. a wide coverage; however, the EIRP is usually not enough for ap-
These periodicities in the transmitted signal are introduced plicability in PCL systems, and the received signals are strongly
for different reasons (e.g., for synchronization purposes), but they attenuated due to long baselines between transmitters and the
also introduce artefacts in the passive radar processing that result receiver. Nevertheless, PCL experiments have been successfully
in potential false alarms if not properly compensated for. WiFi, conducted in past years using GNSS systems as illuminators of
WiMAX, and the least popular HiperLAN are also digital trans- opportunity [27], [28]. An exception is represented by DVB-SH
missions based on OFDM. Their availability is marginal (WiMAX satellites. The near future intention of these satellites is to provide
and HiperLAN) or reduced to very short ranges (WiFi). Never- high quality digital broadcast services to handheld devices such
theless, the possibility to exploit WiFi signals for indoor PCL and as smartphones and tablets. In this case, given the poor receiving
short-range surveillance has been demonstrated [24], [25]. antenna characteristics of the handheld devices, high EIRP values
Cellular phone networks like GSM (but also LTE) offer a wide are foreseen which make such transmitters, together with the previ-
coverage, and are good candidates as illuminator of opportunities ously mentioned OFDM signal characteristics, appealing illumina-
for PCL [26]. DAB is also a good candidate, but its exploitation tors of opportunity for PCL [29]. The actual commercial success of
is highly dependent on the availability of digital radio services. In these services will likely drive their availability (or not) in the near
fact, only some countries in Europe offer these services. On the future. Recent fast emerging concurrent standards like LTE might
other hand, DVB-T currently represents the most used IO for PCL. obscure DVB-SH.
This can be contributed to the facts that DVB-T is now available in
most countries, it uses OFDM modulation, it has adequate signal
bandwidth for most PCL radar applications, and it has adequate
C. ANTENNA ELEVATION CHARACTERISTICS
EIRP values. An undesired peculiarity of DAB and DVB-T is that One of the primary objectives in broadcast engineering is to
they usually operate in a so-called SFN. In a SFN, all transmitters achieve wide-area coverage with adequate field intensity so that
belonging to the network simultaneously transmit the same signal users can receive the transmissions of interest. The “users” in
at the same frequencies. From a PCL point of view, this means terms of broadcast engineering usually refer to ground-based re-
that multiple replicas of the direct signal will be collected at the ceivers for such services as FM radio, TV, DAB, DVB-T, GSM,
receiver (i.e., multipaths), and that a single target might generate etc. In the case of commonly used illuminators of opportunity for
multiple echoes at the receiver (one for each nearby transmitter). passive radar purposes, namely FM, DAB, and DVB-T, the field
As a consequence, the PCL system might not only suffer from mul- strength produced by a station depends, among other things, on
tipath target detection (due to strong multipath effects), but might Equivalent Radiated Power (ERP), antenna heights, local terrain,
also experience ambiguous association between echoes and the and tropospheric scattering conditions. The antenna systems usu-
transmitter that generated the echo (making target geolocalization ally consist of several individual radiating bays fed as a phased
more complicated). Even in the presence of these drawbacks, PCL array. Their radiation characteristics concentrate the energy in
experimental and operational systems based on DVB-T have been the horizontal plane towards the population to be served, mini-

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Passive Radar Tutorial

Figure 10.
Illustration of the elevation beam pattern tilted below the horizontal.
Figure 12.
Sketch of the bistatic geometry in two-dimensional Cartesian coordi-
nates.

ties, the DVB consortium introduced SFN as a way to optimize

spectrum and bandwidth for DVB-T broadcast. SFN topology dif-
fers from MFN topology, where all the transmitters broadcast at
different frequencies. In a SFN, all transmitters of one SFN cell
broadcast at the same frequency, enabling spectrum and bandwidth
optimization. For example, in a MFN a common service area is
illuminated with three different broadcast frequencies occupying
24 MHz bandwidth, while in a SFN approach with bandwidth
optimization, only 8 MHz are occupied. An SFN requires that all
transmitters are coherently transmitting the same signal at the same
time. For that purpose, GPS disciplined oscillators are generally
used on transmission. Likewise using GPS-locked oscillators on
receive can provide a synchronisation advantage for PCL systems
using SFN illumination.
Figure 11.
Representation of antenna elevation pattern in polar coordinates.
VI. BISTATIC RADAR
mising the radiation out into space. Minimising the radiation out
into space (i.e., beyond the horizon) requires the vertical plane Since passive radar is inherently bistatic or even multistatic, an ex-
radiation pattern to be tilted slightly below the horizontal. This cursion to the basics of bistatic radar is considered helpful for the
is a common procedure in broadcast engineering and is referred understanding of passive radar processing. Based on the bistatic
to as beam-tilt. The beam-tilt principle is illustrated in Fig. 10. geometry with separated locations for transmitter and receiver, the
Fig. 11 is a representation of an antenna elevation pattern in polar bistatic radar equation is introduced, leading to the location depen-
coordinates. Point 1 in Fig. 11 indicates the peak of the beam at dent range and Doppler resolution. With the curves of constant sig-
the horizon (the illustration does not depict beam-tilt). The ERP nal to noise ratio (Ovals of Cassini) and the ellipsoids of constant
refers to the effective power output from the antenna in a specified target echo delay, the key differences between mono- and bistatic
direction and includes the transmitter power output, transmission- radar are addressed leading to the various schemes of geolocation
line losses, and antenna power gain. The maximum ERP occurs at in multistatic configurations.
the peak of the beam where the beamwidth is narrowest. Point 2
refers to the maximum field pattern (equivalent to the -3 dB beam-
width). The strength of the main lobe falls off increasingly as the
A. BISTATIC GEOMETRY
angle from the centre of the beam increases. It is conventional to A two-dimensional sketch of the bistatic geometry of a PCL radar
consider the -3 dB beamwidth to determine the size of the anten- system in Cartesian coordinates is depicted in Fig. 12. The loca-
nas frontal area (aperture). tion of the transmitter is labeled as “tx”, the receiver as “rx”, and
the target as “tgt”. The plane containing the transmitter, the re-
ceiver, and the target is called bistatic plane. Please note that in the
D. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MFN AND SFN usual case of ground-based transmitter/receiver and airborne tar-
Considering the price of broadcasting licences, operating a net- get, the bistatic plane is not parallel to the Earth surface. The line
work where the ratio between spectrum and bandwidth is opti- between the transmitter and the receiver is denoted as the base-
mized becomes important. Based on OFDM modulation proper- line, L. The range from the transmitter to the target is RT, while the

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 Kuschel, Cristallini, and Olsen

1∂  1∂ ∂ 
f bist =  Rbist ( t )  =  RT (t ) + RR (t )  . (1)
λ  ∂t  λ  ∂t ∂t 

As is apparent, the bistatic Doppler is comprised of two con-

tributions, the first due to the relative radial motion between
transmitter and target, and the second due to the relative motion
between target and receiver. In the usual PCL radar case the trans-
mitter and receiver are stationary, therefore the measured bistatic
Doppler only depends on the target motion. In this particular case,
the bistatic Doppler frequency can be expressed as

V 2V
f bist = cos (α − β / 2 ) + cos (α + β / 2 )  = cos α cos ( β / 2 ) (2)
λ λ

Figure 13.
Sketch of the bistatic range resolution. where V is the modulus of the target velocity vector and α is the
orientation of V with respect to the bisector of the bistatic angle
range from the target to the receiver is RR. The angle between the (see Fig. 12). It is important to note that any target moving along
transmitter and the receiver with vertex at the target is denoted as the baseline between the transmitter and the receiver will have a
the bistatic angle β. The bistatic range Rbist is calculated through zero bistatic Doppler frequency, since the two terms in (1) can-
TDOA measurements corresponding to Rbist = RT + RR – L. The cel out each other. On the other hand, in the extended baseline
locus of points at constant bistatic range define iso-range lines, case (i.e., when β = 0) the bistatic Doppler reduces to the mo-
that are represented by ellipses in the bistatic plane of Fig. 12 (in nostatic Doppler. By observing (1), it is also important to notice
a three-dimensional representation they are ellipsoids) where the that the bistatic Doppler will be zero for all targets moving along
transmitter and the receiver are located at the foci. The sum RT + the bistatic iso-range; that is, the bistatic range Rbist(t) does not
RR equals twice the semimajor axis of the corresponding ellipse. change over time. Therefore, targets moving on such trajectories
An important property is that the bisector of the bistatic angle is would not be detectable in such a bistatic geometry, as the cor-
always orthogonal to the tangent of the iso-range contour in any responding echo returns will exhibit zero-Doppler, exactly the
point of the ellipse. same as the strong clutter returns. In this case, the exploitation
of a multistatic configuration would provide geometry diversity
gain, thus allowing for detection of all possible motions. In other
B. BISTATIC RANGE RESOLUTION words, when multiple Tx-Rx bistatic pairs are possible they can
The range resolution in the monostatic case is defined as the be defined such that blind motions in one bistatic configuration
minimum distance between two targets that still allows the radar are not blind in other configurations. This means that targets are
to distinguish the corresponding returns. In meters, this corre- always detectable regardless of their motion, with an evident im-
sponds to the well-known formula δ Rmono = cτ/2, where c is the provement of the overall situational awareness over the observed
speed of light in vacuum, and τ is the temporal duration of the area. This idea has been firstly introduced in a simultaneous mo-
pulse (if range compression is applied, τ = 1/B where B is the nostatic and bistatic Ground Moving Target Indicator configura-
processed transmitted signal bandwidth). In other words, in the tion in [30], but it can be easily extended to the multistatic PCL
monostatic case δ Rmono is defined as the difference of two con- case. In the following we will analyze the simplest multi-static
centric circles having a difference in radius of c/2B. An exten- configuration with two transmitters T1 and T2 and one receiver;
sion of this concept in the bistatic case is possible. To do that, however, the analysis can be easily extended to more than two
let us define a pseudo-monostatic range resolution δ Rpseudo as the transmitters and more receivers readily. By properly defining the
separation between two concentric iso-range ellipses having the receiver position R, targets moving along the first bistatic iso-
semi major axis a and a′, where δ Rpseudo = a – a′ = c/2B. The two range will exhibit a Doppler modulation in the second bistatic
aforementioned concentric ellipses are shown in Fig. 13. From dataset, and vice versa.
Fig. 13 it is clear that the bistatic range resolution δ Rbist not only
depends on δ Rpseudo, but also on the specific position within the
ellipse. By explicating this latter dependence in terms of the bi-
D. BISTATIC RADAR EQUATION
static angle β, one can approximate the bistatic range resolution The bistatic radar equation defines the basis for a detection per-
as δ Rbist ≈ c/(2B cos(β/2)) [9]. formance analysis of a PCL radar system. Specifically, it allows
calculation of the expected Signal to Noise Ratio (SNR) as a func-
tion of target position and RCS, as well as transmitter and receiver
C. BISTATIC DOPPLER characteristics (like transmitted power and antenna diagrams). It
The bistatic Doppler is defined as the bistatic range rate Rbist over also allows estimation of the maximum detection range of the ra-
time normalized by the carrier wavelength λ [9]. That is, dar system once the desired detection and false alarm probabili-

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Passive Radar Tutorial

ties are defined together with target fluctuation models. For PCL omni directional (azimuth), and for simplicity we assume GR = GRD.
2 2
systems exploiting SFN transmitters, the target echo signal always Solving (7) for RTi RRi, which gives the equivalent monostatic range
competes with a strong direct signal. With respect to thermal noise, R0, and selecting the dominant i = D transmitter as the source of the
the target echo signal is increased by the processing gain resulting correlation noise, we obtain:
from the correlation process Gcorr. Thus, in many situations, spe-
cifically when transmitters are close to the receiver, the limiting PTi GTi σ L2DGcorr
R0 = 4 . (8)
factor is not thermal noise but rather the correlation side lobes of 4π PTD GTD FD ( SNR )
the closest or strongest transmitter in the net. A quantitative com-
parison between direct signal interference and thermal noise level where LD is the baseline to the dominant transmitter, FD the corre-
can be found in [23, Ch.7.2.3]. In order to determine the detection sponding propagation factor, and PTD GTD are the power and gain of
range capability and thus the bi- or multistatic coverage of a PCL the dominant transmitter in the direction of the receiver. Hence, the
radar receiver, the power level of the direct transmitter signals at measures to increase R0, which can be influenced by the receiver
the location of the receiver has to be known. Let S di be the power either through the choice of location or processing, are:
density of the ith transmitter at the location of the receiver,
CC increase the distance to the dominant transmitter,
PTi GTi Fi CC increase the correlation gain and
S di = (3)
4π L2i
CC reduce the propagation factor.
where PTi is the transmitted power of the ith transmitter, GTi is the
gain of the ith transmitter in the direction to the receiver, Fi is the
propagation factor on the path from the ith transmitter to the re-
E. OVALS OF CASSINI
ceiver, and Li is the ith transmitter to receiver baseline. The re- The Ovals of Cassini [9] are contours where SNR and the range
ceived power in the passive radar receiver with an antenna gain of product RTRR are held constant. The SNR is highest around the
GRi in the direction of the ith transmitter is then given by: transmitter and receiver sites, dropping off as one gets further and
further away from these. At a point in the middle of the baseline
PTi GTi FTi λ 2GRi between the transmitter and receiver sites (L/2), the ovals break
Pdi = Sdi AR = . (4)
4π L2i 4π into two nonconnected ovals, one around the transmitter, and the
other around the receiver. The point on the baseline [9] where this
The correlation side lobes of the ith direct signal, denoted as
happens is called the cusp, and the curve is called a lemniscate (of
correlation noise N corri, are reduced with respect to the correlation
two parts), and it looks like the infinity sign ∞. The Ovals of Cas-
peak by the correlation gain Gcorr. That is,
sini are shown as solid contour lines in Fig. 14 for a bistatic radar
system where the baseline is 40 km. The lemniscate is not shown,
PTi GTi FTi λ 2GRi but the cusp is at the origin and the behavior of the ovals are ap-
N corri = . (5)
4π L2i 4π Gcorr parent. If the baseline is increased, the ovals will shrink towards a
lemniscate, and finally collapse in a circle, one around the trans-
The SNR of a target echo, competing with the correlation noise mitter and one around the receiver [9].
of the dominant (strongest, closest) transmitter N corrD in the net, For a monostatic radar the Ovals of Cassini collapse to circles
depends on the targets RCS σ and the power of the illuminating of constant SNR with the radar in the center, and the constant range
transmitters, which can, under optimum conditions, be all trans- contours (circles) coincide with the constant SNR contours. For
mitters in the net. the bistatic case this is not true. Fig. 14 shows the Ovals of Cassini
overlaid with isorange contours, the constant range ellipses, for a
PTi GTi FTi λ 2GR σ FRi bistatic radar system. It is obvious from the figure that two targets
1
SNR = . (6) (assumed to be equal) at different range profiles can result in the
4π RT2i 4π 4π RR2i N corrD
same SNR, or vice versa, that two equal targets at the same isor-
ange contour can result in different SNR in the radar. Willis [9] has
with FTi and FRi being the respective propagation factors on the path
estimated the instantaneous SNR dynamic range for an isorange
from the transmitter to the target then on to the receiver, and RTi and
contour in a bistatic radar system as a function of the eccentricity e
RRi being the respective distances. GR and GTi denote the receiver
and ith transmitter antenna gains respectively in the direction of the
S 4
target. Inserting (5) into (6) results in Δ =
( ( ))
2
N 1 + cos 2sin −1 e (9)

PTi GTi FTi λ 2GR σ FRi L2DGcorr

SNR = . (7) where the ratio of maximum to minimum target SNR on an isor-
2
RTi 4π RRi PTD GTD FTD λ 2GRD
2
ange contour, defined as an ellipse of eccentricity, e. This shows
that especially in forward scatter applications, the instantaneous
For free space conditions, which lead to maximum detection dynamic range can be large, that is, eccentricity e → 1. For the mo-
ranges, FT and FR are 1. The receiver antenna is assumed to be nostatic case, eccentricity e = 0, and the dynamic range difference

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 Kuschel, Cristallini, and Olsen

get quite severe as e → 0, and thus S/N →

∞ as seen in (9).

F. TARGET GEO-LOCALIZATION
THROUGH ELLIPSOIDS INTERSECTION
Fig. 15 shows an illustration of a multistatic
radar system. In the scene, three transmit-
ters and one receiver, all with omni direc-
tional antennas, are assumed to see the
target simultaneously. For each transmitter-
receiver pair the target's constant range pro-
file is drawn. From the illustration it is clear
that the target is located at the intersection
of the three ellipses. The rest of the inter-
sections not corresponding to real targets
are called ghosts and should be recognized
as such in the signal processing. They can
easily be found in Fig. 15, since this is an
oversimplified situation used to illustrate
the concept. In real life the number of trans-
Figure 14. mitters can be more than three, the ellipses
The Ovals of Cassini (solid line), and the isorange contours (dotted lines).
are actually ellipsoids, and the number of
targets is usually higher than one. An ex-
ample of such a situation from a real system is shown by Howland
in [1, pp. 168, Figs. 6–42]. Howland [1, pp. 162] has developed a
general expression for the maximum number of ghosts in the 2D
situation, f(M, T), generated by T targets and M transmit-receive
pairs

(
f ( M , T ) = 2T 2 − T )( M 2
−M ) 2. (10)

Table 1 shows the maximum number of intersections (or ghosts)

as a function of M bistatic transmitter-receiver pairs and T targets
present in the scene. It is seen that the number of ghosts increases
rapidly as new transmitters and/or targets are added to the scene.
For M = 8 transmitter-receiver pairs, and T = 1, the maximum num-
ber of ghosts is f(8, 1) = 28. The corresponding numbers for T = 5,
and T = 10 are f(8, 5) = 1,260, and f(8, 10) = 5,320, respectively. In
order to reduce the number of ghosts an indication of target direc-
tion might be very efficient. If the receiver is able to determine in
which quadrant the target is, the maximum number of intersections
is drastically reduced. This spatial discrimination will also reduce
Figure 15. the number of targets generating constant range ellipses, and thus
The figure shows a multistatic radar system with three transmitters (black also the number of ghosts. This is exemplified with two red lines
circles) and one receiver (red circle). In the scene there is one target pres-
ent at position (–100 km, –100 km). The target's constant range profile is
in Fig. 15, where the number of candidates is reduced from four to
drawn for each of the three transmitter-receiver pairs (black lines), also two. This rough direction/quadrant estimate is normally achieved
showing three ghosts. The red lines indicate a quadrant with respect to the by the receiver antenna beamforming.
receiver, mimicking a coarse receiver antenna beamforming. Alternatively, in a pure bistatic situation target geo-localisation
can be obtained by intersecting the direction of arrival of the target
echo measured through antenna beamforming, with the ellipsoid
is zero as expected. For the bistatic case, as the target gets further
determined by the time difference of arrival of the target echo sig-
and further away from the transmitter/receiver pair, the Ovals of
nal with respect to the direct signal. In this case the radar resolution
Cassini will approach circles and the dynamic range difference will
no longer depends only on the signal bandwidth, but also on the
approach zero, i.e., the monostatic situation. However, going the
beamwidths of the receiver antenna. Unlike in monostatic radar,
other way and approaching the baseline, the effects of this might

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Table 1.

Maximum Number of Ghosts Generated by T Targets for M Transmit-Receive Pairs [1]

M \T 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

2 1 6 15 28 45 66 91 120 153 190

3 3 18 45 84 135 198 273 360 459 570
4 6 36 90 168 270 396 546 720 918 1,140
5 10 60 150 280 450 660 910 1,200 1,530 1,900
6 15 90 225 420 675 990 1,365 1,800 2,295 2,850
7 21 126 315 588 945 1,386 1,911 2,520 3,213 3,990
8 28 168 420 784 1,260 1,848 2,548 3,360 4,284 5,320

the size of the resolution cell does not only vary with range but also used in PCL, the echo signal is correlated with Doppler-shifted
with the bistatic geometry. replicas of the reference signal. This creates a bank of range com-
pression filters, each one matched to a particular potential Doppler
of the target. It allows the unambiguous estimation of the bistatic
VII. PASSIVE RADAR PROCESSING Doppler frequency in addition to the unambiguous bistatic target
The signals received by a passive radar contain the direct signal, range measurement. The specific characteristics of the ambiguity
reflections from moving objects, reflections from stationary ob- function depend on the signal of opportunity that is being used.
jects, and noise. They are processed in various stages in order to In general, signals having a thumbtack-shaped ambiguity function
discriminate the moving target from unwanted stationary returns in are preferred since a low constant side-lobe level over the range/
the presence of a dominant direct signal and to finally build a target Doppler plane diminishes the risk of strong targets masking the
track. These stages range from the cross-correlation of the direct weak ones.
signal with the echo signals, described by the ambiguity function, Due to the signal structure, digital transmissions like DVB-T
to detection schemes discriminating target echoes from noise, to have periodicities in both time and frequency. For the purpose of
tracking sequences of detections first in the range-Doppler domain broadcasting they are used for receiver synchronization. Those pe-
and then in the Cartesian domain. riodicities usually appear in the ambiguity function in the form of
sidelobes located at specific range/Doppler positions. Since a re-
duction of these undesired sidelobes through conventional tapering
A. CROSS-CORRELATION (like Hamming, Taylor, Chebyshev windowing) is not effective,
The cross-correlation between the direct signal and the echo signal other specific techniques such as those presented in [31], [32] have
(see Figs. 7 and 8), also referred to as range-Doppler correlation, is to be exploited. In digital processing, the ambiguity function (11)
the key step of the PCL processing. The aim of this step is to recog- will be approximated by the sum over N samples
nize the weak target contributions, which are delayed and Doppler
N −1
shifted in the received signal. χ τ , f D  =  ssurv nTs sref − j 2π f
nTs − τ e
∗ D nTs / N
. (12)
The performance of the cross-correlation with varying time- n =0

delay and Doppler shift strongly depends on the signal waveform

and is generally described by the ambiguity function. In passive The temporal integration interval is usually limited to the co-
bistatic radar this ambiguity function does not only depend on the herent integration time Tint. A reduction of the computational bur-
waveform, but in addition on the location of the target in a bistatic den can be achieved by implementing the correlation in (12) in the
geometry. This variation is not respected in the cross-correlation frequency domain by means of a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT).
processing, but has to be taken into account in the later stages like The so-called Correlation FFT Algorithm [33] takes advantage of
range-Doppler tracking. the fact that the samples along one Doppler bin are the cross-corre-
The expression of the cross-correlation χ(τ, fD) is lation between a Doppler shifted replica of the surveillance signal
and the reference signal. This correlation becomes a multiplication
+∞
χ (τ , f D ) =  ssurv ( t ) sref
∗
( t − τ ) e− j 2π f t dt
D (11) in the frequency domain and the Doppler bin for the Doppler shift
−∞
fD can be calculated by
where ssurv(t) is the complex envelope of the signal received in the
surveillance channel, sref(t) is a (cleaned) replica of the transmit- χ τ  f = IDFT {ssurv, f [k ]sref
D
∗
[k ]}. (13)
D

ted signal, τ is the potential TDOA of the target echo signal, and
fD is the potential corresponding bistatic Doppler. Basically, due The Fourier transformation of the reference signal only needs
to the very poor Doppler robustness of the signals of opportunity to be calculated once for all Doppler bins. The same applies for the

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 Kuschel, Cristallini, and Olsen

surveillance signal, if we take into account that the Doppler shifted ing tracks directly in the range/range-rate domain, and leads to a
replicas of the surveillance signal can be obtained by a circular reduced number of ellipsoid intersection tests and mitigates the
shift of the samples in the frequency domain. ghost target phenomenon, greatly reducing the association prob-
lem for the Cartesian tracker.
The range/Doppler tracking algorithm might be based on a lin-
B. DETECTION IN PCL ear Kalman filter [35], [36] that exploits range-Doppler measure-
The detection stage in PCL does not differ from that of other radar ments returned by a clustering algorithm. Data association is then
systems, being the decision process that determines whether a tar- performed, and the track initiation, confirmation and cancellation
get is present in a given range/Doppler cell or not. The main issues are obtained by using a “m out of n” logic. Among all techniques,
which have to be considered are: the Global Nearest Neighbor approach might be used to perform
the data association, which attempts to find and to propagate the
CC statistical characteristics of the disturbance;
single most likely data association hypothesis at each scan. In de-
CC occupation of a single target in terms of range/Doppler cells; tail, an ellipsoidal gate is used [35].
Every unassociated detection initiates a tentative track. If in the
CC residual unremoved clutter.
subsequent scans a tentative track is associated with a detection,
In PCL, the main disturbance source is the direct signal, and which falls into its gate, a tentative track is promoted to a con-
not the receiver thermal noise. As a consequence, one should make firmed track. Otherwise, a tentative track is deleted. A confirmed
sure that the Additive White Gaussian Noise assumption holds, be- track is deleted if it is not updated by detections over a given num-
fore calculating the detection threshold T. If this is not the case, ber of processing intervals or a certain period of time.
the statistical model of the disturbance should be adequately modi- The target position and velocity estimate are initialized from
fied, for instance by fitting other Probability Density Functions to the received detections.
the histogram of the interference, and then deriving the detection
threshold accordingly. An erroneous modelling of the disturbance
statistics may lead to a significant increase of false alarms.
The target dimension in the range/Doppler map depends highly
D. TARGET GEO-LOCALIZATION THROUGH RANGE AND
on the physical target dimensions and on the PCL resolution in DOA MEASUREMENTS
range and Doppler. While for FM radio-based PCL systems an air
In order to localize the target in Cartesian coordinates and enhance
target is usually confined in one range gate, this does not neces-
the signal to noise ratio, one approach is to measure the Direction
sarily apply for DVB-T based PCL due to the much better range
of Arrival (DOA) of the echo signal in addition to measuring the
resolution. Due to this, it can be useful to implement clustering
range. An experimental PCL-system of Fraunhofer FHR utilises a
algorithms. These algorithms group multiple adjacent range/Dop-
uniformly spaced linearly array of 11 discone antennas and a spatial
pler cells where detections are declared, and group the different
smoothing Bucci beamforming algorithm [37] for direction mea-
detections as coming from a single target. The use of clustering has
surements. By using the range measurements and the estimated
significant effects in reducing the overall number of detections,
DOA it is possible to localize a target as the intersection of an iso-
where typical clustering techniques may be taken from image pro-
range contour (an ellipsoid with foci at the location of the trans-
cessing [34].
mitter and the receiver) and the DOA cone. In the particular case
Clutter is usually present in PCL systems in terms of surveil-
where the altitude of a target is unknown and consequently assumed
lance channel direct signal and multipath. Several techniques that
to be zero, the DOA degenerates into a line and the ellipsoid into
exploit the temporal and spatial domains can be introduced for
an ellipsis. Considering the low elevation illumination of broadcast
suppressing this interference. These clutter suppression techniques
transmitters, this can be considered a first order rough estimate. The
might not lead to an ideal cancellation of the interference, thus giv-
iso-range contour and the DOA (θR) are shown in Fig. 12.
ing rise to residual unremoved clutter. Such residual unremoved
A target being tracked in the range/Doppler domain, as shown
disturbances, together with erroneous modelling of the disturbance
in Fig. 16, can now be tracked in the Cartesian domain as well. The
statistics and imperfections in the clustering, may lead to an overall
Cartesian track is depicted in Fig. 17. In both figures the estimated
number of false alarms significantly greater than the desired value.
tracks are represented in yellow and the GPS truth collected dur-
This is one of the main issues of PCL systems that has to be dealt
ing the trial are represented in red. The offset between the GPS
with in the tracking algorithms.
and the tracks is caused primarily by insufficient knowledge of the
The tracker is usually implemented in two stages, first in the
transmitter position.
range/Doppler domain to reduce false alarms, and successively
in the Cartesian domain to geo-localise the target and smooth the
track. E. TARGET GEO-LOCALIZATION THROUGH ELLIPSOIDS
INTERSECTION
C. TARGET RANGE/DOPPLER TRACKING If a DOA estimation is not available, multiple transmitter-receiver
A first tracking stage in the range-Doppler domain is used to re- pairs can be used to localize a target in Cartesian coordinates by
duce false alarms. It handles clutter and missed detections by form- calculating the intersection point of the ellipsoids using one trans-

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Passive Radar Tutorial

mitter and multiple receivers or multiple

transmitters and one receiver as shown in
Fig. 15.
One of the major challenges in target
localization in PCL using single-frequency
network transmitters is that the source of
the measurements corresponding to differ-
ent transmitters is unknown. Therefore, all
combinations of the measurements need
to be checked for ellipsoid intersection.
When multiple measurements are present,
this can lead to ghost targets which occur
when intersections of ellipsoids of multiple
transmitter-receiver pairs do not correspond
with true target positions.
An additional challenge is that the num-
ber of possible measurement combinations
grows rapidly with the number of the tar-
gets and transmitters. For this reason, it is
desirable to use very fast algorithms for cal-
culating the ellipsoids intersections, so that
Figure 16.
hundreds or thousands of combinations can Tracking of the airplane in the range-Doppler domain.
be processed in real time.

F. DIRECT CARTESIAN TRACKING

As an alternative approach the range-Dop-
pler detections can directly fit into a track-
ing algorithm which pursues multi hypoth-
eses of target motion, a Multi Hypothesis
Tracker (MHT). This tracking could be
more robust with respect to instabilities of
range-Doppler tracks, and potentially apply
more advanced motion models (for exam-
ple an Interacting Multiple Model).
The MHT algorithm was originally de-
veloped by Reid [38]. The hypothesis ori-
ented MHT presents an exhaustive method
of enumerating all possible assignment
track to measurement combinations.

VIII. PERSPECTIVES
Future trends in PCL will need to focus
on overcoming deficiencies in illumina-
tor waveforms, exploiting the potential of
emerging technologies, and exploring new
areas for the application of passive radar
(e.g., PCL on mobile platforms). Figure 17.
Tracking of the airplane in the Cartesian domain.

A. DOPPLER ONLY TRACKING The bistatic velocity can be described as a sum of the values
Since signals like FM and GSM used in passive radars are rela- of velocity vector components towards the transmitter and towards
tively narrowband, the accuracy of range measurements is limited. the receiver. The idea of Doppler-only localization can be derived
Doppler resolution may be obtained through long integration times intuitively from the fact that for different target locations and ve-
provided that a target remains in the resolution cell. locities the measured set of the bistatic velocities will also be dif-

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 Kuschel, Cristallini, and Olsen

ferent. The mutual uniqueness between the bistatic velocities set get Recognition through ISAR and/or HRR-capabilities in a PBR
and the target state obviously depends on the system geometry and system based on DVB-T broadcasters.
the number of transmitters. Simulation results [39], [40] show that Furthermore, even 3D ISAR imaging was demonstrated [56],
measurements of the Doppler shifts in passive radar systems can and comprehensive theoretical work [57] and experiments on pas-
not only improve localization and tracking algorithms accuracy, sive radar imaging were published [56], [58]–[63].
but also provide sufficient information about the target position
and velocity. That means that Doppler-based localization algo-
rithms in PCL systems can be used to bypass the range resolution
IX. CONCLUSION
limitations of narrowband signals. With the development in signal processing and data processing
technology in recent years, and advances in algorithmic develop-
ment, PBR and PCL has reached a stage of maturity which has
B. PCL ON MOBILE PLATFORMS allowed industries to approach the market with demonstrator sys-
Early work pointed out the PBR potential of exploiting ground- tems. The demonstrators are primarily aimed at the needs of the
based broadcasters for air-to-air surveillance [41], while the first military for air surveillance, gap filling, and object protection.
published demonstrations were presented around 2010 [42], [43]. In addition, research organisations, universities, and industries
At UCL an FM-radio receiver was installed in a private air- have proposed passive radar sensors for civilian applications [64].
craft and flown with the intention of detecting commercial airliners Examples include traffic density monitoring, monitoring of private
in the vicinity of London's Heathrow and Gatwick airports [42]. airfields, harbour traffic monitoring, and passive radar collision
Detections of commercial airliners were demonstrated, and also warning for wind turbines.
verified from the Automatic Dependent Surveillance-data flight While the technology is ready and processing has demon-
paths. Further encouraging results followed from a data collection strated the capability to deal with current illuminator signals, the
campaign [44], [45]. Also, Warsaw University of Technology [43], signal environment is constantly changing due to the changing
[46] presented early demonstrations of an airborne PBR concept needs of broadcast and communication networks. For example,
supported by real measurements. This work focused on the signal analogue TV was replaced by digital TV (i.e., DVB-T), which is in
processing challenges of airborne PBR, and was also followed by turn being replaced by DVB-T2. FM-radio is gradually disappear-
further promising results [47]–[49]. ing, partly being replaced by DAB. Mobile communications have
A final observation from the perspective of airborne PBR developed from GSM to UMTS and LTE with the perspective of
would be the imaging of the ground/surface. The current status 5G. This constant changing requires high flexibility of the passive
of the research field is elegantly represented in the Swedish work radar receiver which today can be best met with software defined
presented in [50]. radar concepts.
Reference [51] proposes a new concept of Earth observation Such cost efficient concepts are based on digitising the re-
from space where ground-based DVB-T transmitters are illuminat- ceived signals as close as possible to the receiver antenna elements
ing the ground while the passive radar receiver is space borne on a and processing them in the digital domain. They are, however, lim-
satellite in Low Earth Orbit receiving the ground reflected energy ited by the capability of the AD conversion to span the required
and producing Synthetic Aperture Radar imagery of the ground. dynamic range.
The concept is supported by proof-of-concept measurements ob- Since the development of AD converters towards higher sam-
tained by a surface moving platform. pling rates and larger dynamic ranges is driven by the consumer
market needs and has not kept pace with the development of com-
puter processing power, lacking performance may still need the
C. EMERGING TECHNOLOGY consideration of advanced solutions for the remaining analogue
CPU and GPU technological trends in combination with fast AD components, specifically the antenna.
conversion at high dynamic ranges enable the processing of larger Thus, for some applications, smart antenna concepts with so-
bandwidths, e.g., multiple DVB-T channels, and thus provide bet- phisticated spatial and spectral performance in combination with
ter range resolution. flexible receiver front-ends are still a requirement and may be for
With such improved range resolution, a radar sensor with high some time.
range and Doppler resolution as well as 100% time on target can
be achieved. This will be a good starting point for creating bistatic
High Range Resolution (HRR) profiles and bistatic Inverse Syn-
X. RECOMMENDED FURTHER READING
thetic Aperture Radar (ISAR) images. For the interested reader the following sources are recommended:
Work on exploiting more of the available energy has also Bistatic radar was for a long time described in the book of N.
been reported [52]–[55]. It has been demonstrated that combining Willis [9]. Recent development and research has resulted in the
DVB-T bands yields improved range resolution, while extending newer major publications like N. Willis and H. Griffiths “Ad-
the coherent integration time yields finer Doppler resolution. This vances in Bistatic Radar” [1], H. Griffiths and C. Baker “An In-
motivates classification approaches towards smaller and slower troduction to Passive Radar” [65], M. Cherniakov “Bistatic Radar:
targets while also sub-target resolutions of larger targets might be Principles and Practice” [66], and “Bistatic Radar: Emerging Tech-
achievable. The results offer the potential of Non-Cooperative Tar- nology” [2].

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Passive Radar Tutorial

Bistatic radar is also included with two full chapters (Chapter [21] [Online] [Link]
44: Bistatic radar, and Chapter 45: Distributed Radar and Multiple [22] Dupont, J. AIR and COSMOS no.1984. University College London,
In Multiple Out (MIMO) radar) in the third edition of Stimson's nATO DRG Symposium, Tech Rep., May 2005.
“Introduction to Airborne Radar” [67], while the second edition [23] Kuschel, H. et al. Experimental passive radar systems using digital
barely treated the subject. illuminators (DAB/DVB-T). In Proceedings of the 2014 15th Interna-
tional Radar Symposium (IRS), 2007, 1–4.
[24] Bournaka, G., Baruzzi, A., Heckenbach, J., and Kuschel, H. Experi-
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